Guidelines, who needs guidelines – WE DO!
By Lynn Greenberg
When I first started designing yearbooks, I didn’t quite understand the differences between all those extra warning lines on the pages, but with a little knowledge about those 3 special lines, you can make sure your yearbook doesn’t fall into one of the yearbook regrets!
Here is a simple explanation for those three lines on a page. Once you know them, you can avoid a white edge, cutoff image, or text!
Guidelines are there to help you place items on the page and hold your hand through to the end!
The quick explanation:
The Safety line means anything inside that safety line is safe and will not be cut off.
The Cut line is where the pages will be cut.
The Bleed line is where you want your backgrounds to extend so they go to the edge of the page, leaving no white space.
The longer explanation:
Safety Line: The Purple guideline is your margin, which is also the safety zone. Any items or content you do not want to get cut off must stay within the purple guidelines. The text should be positioned at least 1/8 (.125) inch away from the trim line to ensure the text doesn’t get cut off or end up too close to the edge of the finished page, should the paper shift during the trimming process.
Cut Line: The black guideline is where your pages will get trimmed down during the printing process. Paper can shift during the trimming process, and the trim line can vary slightly, which makes bleed and safe zones very important.
Bleed Line: The red guideline is called the bleed. You must make sure to bring your backgrounds to the red guidelines. If you decide to have your pictures or images or type fill the entire page, then make sure they bleed well. Don’t expand anything to the bleed that you don’t want cut off!
Each of these lines is important when placing your text, photo, captions, and backgrounds on the page and they also apply to the Cover Design. You want to ensure your cover background goes edge to edge, so go to the bleed line!
I found this information with a nice video in the Entourage Yearbook Knowledge base: Click Here